Sermon Tone Analysis

We all like “better” don’t we? No, not butter, BETTER.

We may or may not like butter, but we certainly like better.

In fact, I think it may be in our DNA.

We scramble over one another in a sale to get something better.

We search the Internet for something better.

We want a better product, a better deal, a better seat, a better home, a better job, a better anything.

And, importantly, we know what makes our better “whatever-it-is”, better than the rest.

We know our better in detail.

It’s bigger, its quicker, it’s got more of this, or added that.

It does that, yes, but it also does this!

We know just how it’s better; and, if you give us half a chance, we’ll be able to bore you silly telling you, in graphic detail, just why it is so much better.

Well, this morning, Phil has given me that half a chance, so I’m going to seize the opportunity to tell you all about my better.

However, I very much hope I’m not going to bore you, and I don’t think I will, because there’s a very good chance in fact, that we both already share that very same better.

So, you’re thinking, “What the Dickens are you talking about now Barry?

How can I relax into my usual Sunday morning reverie with you deliberately stirring up my curiosity?

Well, perhaps that’s my point really.

So here goes.

But, before I come to my better, I do need to point out that the previous model was quite something itself.

When I remind you about that, I think you’ll really begin to appreciate how superlative my better really is.

So hold tight – here we go!

Squeezed between two horrendous lists of curses for those who fail to qualify, Deuteronomy 28 provides a package of Old Covenant blessings that frankly are mouth-wateringly desirable.

You can read the full list for yourself in Deuteronomy 28:1-14, but for the sake of time and so as not to get you over-excited, I’ll just give you some of the highlights.

“You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the country.

The fruit of your womb will be blessed, and the crops of your land and the young of your livestock—the calves of your herds and the lambs of your flocks.

Your basket and your kneading trough will be blessed.

You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out.

The LORD will grant that the enemies who rise up against you will be defeated before you.

They will come at you from one direction but flee from you in seven.

The LORD will send a blessing on your barns (and here’s, my special favourite . .

.) and on everything you put your hand to….” (Deuteronomy 28:3–8)

That’s pretty good isn’t it?

For an OLD Covenant, that’s quite respectable, I think you’ll agree.

If there wasn’t anything else, I don’t know about you, but I’d call that a good deal – a very good deal!

But of course, good as this Old Covenant undoubtedly is, I’m here to remind us all today that there IS something better.

If you want proof, listen to Hebrews 7:22 “. . .

Jesus has become the guarantee of a BETTER covenant.”

And Hebrews 8:6 confirms that, it says: “But the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs (that’s the Old Covenant High Priests) as the covenant of which he is mediator is SUPERIOR to the old one, and it is founded on BETTER promises.

That’s game, set and match!

The New Covenant is fundamentally BETTER than the Old Covenant.

Now of course to be better, I think we can take it as read that if something good is provided in the Old Covenant it has to be there or improved on in the New Covenant or we couldn’t really say it was better.

So we can safely assume that the New Covenant, which is the basis on which you and I are admitted to God’s family, the basis on which we have been “redeemed” and have received “adoption to sonship” as Galatians 4:4-5 tells us, is distinctly and emphatically BETTER than the Old version.

So you and I have definitely fallen on our feet, if we have come into God’s family on the basis of this better covenant.

And, if you haven’t yet done that, don’t leave here today without first finding out how you can.

Now there is something vital for us to grasp about covenants and that is that covenants, and the two we’re considering today are no exception, are conditional.

You have to do something; you have to do your part in order to benefit from them.

Covenants are conditional – you do your bit and you get what’s promised.

Don’t do your part and you’ll miss out on the benefits that the covenant offers.

In the case of the Old Covenant those brilliant blessings that I read earlier were prefixed by a very significant sentence.

Deuteronomy 28:1 begins with the words: “If”, notice that, “IF” this covenant is conditional on us doing something, “If you fully obey the LORD your God and carefully follow all his commands I give you today, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations on earth.”

And then it goes on to detail the benefits that will follow.

This Old Covenant is predicated then on us being obedient.

IF we’re obedient we get the blessings promised.

If we’re not obedient, we don’t get the blessings.

Actually, it’s worse than that because Deuteronomy 28: 15 says: “However, if you do not obey the LORD your God and do not carefully follow all his commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these CURSES will come upon you and overtake you:” and then goes on to enumerate a whole bunch of very nasty consequences.

But notice too, that the BETTER New Covenant is also conditional.

In Galatians 3:13-14 Paul says: “He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that BY FAITH we might receive the promise of the Spirit.”

And Abraham’s blessing, which, of course, is righteousness by faith rather than works, is the essence of our New Covenant.

So the blessings of this New Covenant are predicated, not on obedience but on the exercise of our faith in what Christ has done for us.

Now that’s not to say incidentally that obedience is not involved at all in the New Covenant, it clearly is.

In fact, it is manifested in what’s called the “obedience of faith” – but that’s a sermon for another day.

So, let’s address the key question: Why is the New Covenant better than the Old Covenant?

Well the first thing to say is that this is a huge subject that we can’t hope to do justice to in just a few minutes this morning, especially as I want us also to look at how we can benefit personally as Christians from the New Covenant Jesus has provided for us.

So let me just give you a flavour, a taste, a precis of just some of the ways in which the New Covenant trumps the Old Covenant.

1. Firstly, the Old Covenant is a works based covenant.

We have to be “good enough” to deserve its blessings.

It’s an “if you” covenant.

If you perform, you will be blessed.

“Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant,” says Exodus 19:5 “then . . .

you will be my treasured possession.”

But the New Covenant is a grace based covenant.

It is based not on what we do or deserve but solely on our faith in what God has already done for us.

God is not saying to us in the New Covenant, “if you”, He is saying “I will”, as in Hebrews 8:10 “This is the covenant I will make . . .

declares the Lord.

I WILL put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts.

I WILL be their God, and they will be my people.”

2. Secondly, dutifully meeting all the requirements of the Old Covenant still leaves us at a distance from God and mediated by priests.

But the New Covenant opens the door to a personal relationship with God for every one of us.

Speaking of the New Covenant Hebrews 8:11 says: “No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest.”

Amazingly then, the New Covenant allows everyone who comes by faith, to come into an intimate and close personal relationship with God.

3. Then thirdly, the Old Covenant does nothing to really resolve our sin problem.

The offerings and sacrifices of the Old Covenant had to be repeated year on year, didn’t they?

They could not permanently deal with our sins.

Why?

Because as it says in Hebrews 10:4 “. . . it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

But the New Covenant provides a one-time, perfect, sinless sacrifice by Christ that deals with the punishment for ALL of our sins for ALL time.

As Hebrews 10:14 says: “... by one sacrifice he has made perfect FOREVER those who are being made holy”.

So the New Covenant is clearly head and shoulders above the Old and its life transforming blessings are available to everyone and anyone prepared to receive them by faith.

The significant thing though, and key thing I want us to register and focus on today, is that while the Old Covenant is conditional on obedience and the New Covenant is conditional on faith in Christ’s perfect sacrifice, there is in fact another condition to receiving the blessings that are promised in these covenants.

In Deuteronomy 29:9 it says: “Carefully follow the terms of this covenant, so that you may prosper in everything you do.”

Now, whilst this is speaking of the Old Covenant, it clearly applies in fact to any covenant, new, old or in-between!

Covenants are conditional, and we need to meet the conditions - obedience, faith or whatever, if we are to benefit from them.

I actually like the Message version of that verse, it puts it this way: “Diligently keep the words of this Covenant.

DO what they say so that you will live well and wisely in every detail.”

The “DO” word there is the clue to the missing ingredient to benefitting from covenant promises - because, whenever we “DO” something, our WILL is involved.

Before obedience can operate to unlock Old Covenant blessings, and before faith can operate to unleash the BETTER New Covenant blessings, our WILL must kick in.

We have to say, “I will obey” to see the fruits of the Old Covenant.

We have to say “I will believe, I will have faith in Christ” to taste the bounties of the New Covenant.

In a sense then, the real key to our part in seeing the blessings God promises us, is the operation of our will, not obedience alone or faith alone.

It is our decision to obey or our decision to believe.

• Before an act of OBEDIENCE there must be, a commitment, of our WILL.